![]() ![]() "Virtually all of the previous 20 years of work on our mapbooks had to be redone from scratch in a digital format," Mr. ![]() To maintain this key differentiator, its team had to manually review, pinpoint and reclassify the location of all the trails, logging roads and recreational points of interest. It's the customized details that set Backroad Mapbooks apart from competitors. ![]() ![]() Automation would not scale to the leel we wanted or include details, such as that rainbow trout can be found in one specific lake." But outsourcing to other companies to expedite the process did not always work out favourably. Mussio says."Although most of the work was done manually by our staff, we also tried using specialized mapping software and hired a couple of GIS specialists to help with this. " Each delivery method for various digital platfrorms required us to adapt the data to ensure it displayed properly, and this was no easy task," Mr. It was a formidable challenge: That meant converting more than 1,250 different topographic maps that included more than two million kilometres of roads, 200,000 kilometres of trails and 30,000 unique recreational points of interest into digital formats compatible with devices such as GPS units, computers, PDF readers and smartphones. Mussio took a big risk by putting the brakes on his traditional source of revenue growth: He pulled away all of his research and production resources, including his full-time mapping staff of three cartographers, from product development of new titles, and instead instructed them to begin the long process of converting all of Backroad Mapbooks'data into digital formats. "We knew it was time to change and adapt." "With the advent of smartphones, this demand was just growing," Mr. Mussio found that, whenever he connected with customers at trade shows or via e-mail, they persistently asked him when his products would be coming out on GPS or online. He and his team carefully researched the areas they mapped and added such details in the form of labels and symbols.īeginning in 2009, Mr. I wanted to quickly spot a trailhead, recreational site or point of interest, such as waterfalls," Mr. "I wasn't a mapper by trade when I started this company, but just wanted to read back-country maps more easily. Mussio produced his first book, Southwestern BC, in 1993, and, over the next few years, the company became an industry-leading provider of topographic maps that display more roads, trails and recreational opportunities than most other other map sources in Canada. With his family lending the initial finances, Mr. When I crunched the numbers, it seemed too good an opportunity to pass up," he says. "My profs helped me develop a really concrete business plan for my thesis. It began as a university project while he was studying business at the University of British Columbia. Mussio started it from his spare bedroom in Burnaby, B.C. The company has been a leading publisher of outdoor recreation books and maps since 1993, when Mr. Mussio realized that he needed to meet customer demands to go digital, or the business was in serious jeopardy. During, 2010, they declined a further 20 per cent to about $1-million.Īt that point, Mr. Between 20, sales fell to $1.2-million from $1.3-million. ![]()
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